How to Make Money Online (Part 1 of 3)

Let’s cut to the chase. Over the next three days, I’ll be covering the three main ways of making money online. These are all legitimate opportunities that I’ve used extensively to make money online.

Some are free. Some cost money. Some are easy. Some take a while to get going. Some earned me a few dollars. Some earned me thousands. One has actually turned into my full-time job. All are legitimate.

Before we get started, I wanted to point out one basic rule that holds true when it comes to making money online. Generally speaking, the easier the work, the less the pay. I made the point repeatedly last week that if someone is offering you a lot of money for little to no work, it’s almost definitely a scam. Keep this general rule of thumb in mind and you’ll be safe.

“Get Paid To…”

Get Paid To (GPT for short) opportunities are all ways of doing simple, easy things online and making some extra money. Remember my basic rule above? These are easy ways of getting paid, so you aren’t going to get paid a whole lot. The good thing about GPT opportunities are they’re almost always 100% free to get started. You’re rewarded for doing simple things online. It’s not brain surgery. You aren’t paid as such. Make sense?

I’ve tried every opportunity on this list and I’ve been paid by every single one. These are all legitimate ways to make some extra money online. I highly recommend creating an account at every site.

Get Paid to Take Surveys

Yes, there are legitimate survey websites out there. Do NOT listen to sites that guarantee you’ll make thousands of dollars doing surveys. At best, you can expect to pick up a few dollars here and there for voicing your opinion. Surveys rarely pay out more than $5 for 15 minutes of your time. Some companies do reward long-term members with higher paying surveys. It’s an easy way to answer a few questions and make a few dollars.

Surveys account for most of the part-time income I pull in. Don’t underestimate the value of online surveys. They do exist and they do pay.

Surveys are given out via invitation. It’s best to sign up for every site below to maximize your chance at getting invited to take a survey. The following sites are all FREE to join. I’ve received checks from all four companies.

Get Paid to Participate in Short Online Polls

Instant Cash Sweepstakes is a market research business that will reward you for taking part in short online polls. Every poll consists of three questions and takes only a few seconds to complete. The polls are a mix between member created questionnaires and polls created by businesses interested in seeing answers from a specific demographic. You can take part in up to 5 polls every three hours.

At the end of each poll you are awarded tickets, coins, or cash.

Tickets – Each day there is a $50 raffle and every ticket you have is an entry into the raffle.

Coins – Coins can be exchanged for entries into a $2 drawing every few hours. The more coins you enter, the better your chances at winning.

Cash – Cold, hard, cash. Not every poll you take will land you money, but every now and then you’ll get a few cents deposited into your account.

There are three main ways to make actual money with Instant Cash Sweepstakes. The first way is through the daily $50 drawing. Every poll you take wins you a random handful of tickets (Bonus tip: the more consistent you are with your polls, the more tickets and coins you can earn) and at the end of the day the tickets are pooled together and a winner is selected. I was actually lucky enough to win the $50 drawing a few weeks ago. Here’s a screenshot of the email I received after cashing out my winnings.

The easiest way to make money is to just keep taking the polls. You can randomly be selected to win a handful of change at the end of each poll. (Another bonus tip: consistency in your answers will also allow you to take more polls per 3-hour block, so be honest!) The polls are fun and they’re a great way to kill some time during the day if you get bored. You just need to log in and remember to take them!

Get Paid to View Ads

Here are two programs I’ve been using for a while now, ClixSense and YouData. They pay you to look at ads and websites. All you have to do is click on a link, look at a website, wait a few seconds, and you’ll get money deposited into your account. This is probably the easiest way to make money on this list. As you can expect, it doesn’t pay as well as the others, but it’s still a great way to make some extra money in your spare time. ClixSense alone has paid me over $250. Not bad!

If you join Clixsense, I highly recommend upgrading to the Premium Level. This will allow you to view hundreds more ads and will quickly pay for itself. Remember to refer your friends and family. This one allows for referrals 8 levels deep. Start building that downline!

Get Paid to Use a Search Engine

This one is a personal favorite of mine. The company is called SwagBucks and they award you simply for using their search engine. Every time you search, there’s a chance you might win SwagBucks and you can redeem SwagBucks in their marketplace for money, gift certificates, or thousands of other items.

Just think how many times per day you use a search engine like Google or Yahoo. Google.com used to be my home page, but I switched it to Swagbucks after I joined. I’m getting the exact same search results, only now I’m slowly making money by doing so.

I’ve actually received over $500 in gift cards from SwagBucks since joining less than a year ago. Definitely join SwagBucks. Here’s an outdated picture of most of my earnings from SwagBucks so far.

SwagBucks is by far my favorite site on this entire list. If you join only one program on this list, make it SwagBucks.

Get Paid to Test Websites

UserTesting.com is hiring regular Internet users, just like you, to test specific websites and record their experiences. You’ll be providing feedback to those website owners and showing them how the average person browses his or her website.

You’ll use their software to record a video of what’s happening on your screen and you’ll be able to narrate your experience. The software will track your mouse movements, clicks, and keystrokes and you’ll have to add in spoken comments. It generally takes 15-20 minutes to test a website and you’ll be paid a steady $10 for doing so. This is the best paying opportunity on this list and is definitely the most amount of work. Still, highly recommended.

Get Paid to Do All of the Above

Finally, we have a program called CashCrate. Really, it’s a giant compilation of this list rolled into one program. You can get paid for answering surveys, participating in polls, viewing sponsor ads, shopping etc. Instead of rambling on about the features of this one, you really just need to click through and check out the website yourself.

I founded this site back in 2007. I lost $50 to a data entry scam when I was still in college. I felt ripped off and had no recourse, but to suck it up and pull an extra shift delivering food to make ends meet.I setup this site so no one would have to go through the same experience I went through. I wanted to stop scam artists from preying on the vulnerable and help regular people learn the true, legitimate ways of making money online.

Join the Discussion

I agree that swag bucks takes some time. Haven’t tried it, but I have looked it over.

A great way to make money online is ChaCha. A friend recommended me the site. You get paid to answer questions from people via text messages. All you have to do is take a few short and simple tests to be sure you know how to use the search engines.

Thanks for these tips! I’ve used most of these before, and they all work well. The only one I’ve gotten paid for (and consistently use) is SwagBucks, simply because it’s quite easy to use! I’ll be sure to try out UserTesting and YouData, since I haven’t heard of those yet.

I’ve used Swag Bucks’ search engine and I eventually switched back to Google. It takes too much time to find good results because, for every group of legitimate results it returns, you get a group of ads that are only sometimes relevant. For example, try searching “scholarship websites”. This is how the first page of results is set up: 4 ads -> 3 results -> 3 ads -> 1 result -> 2 ads -> 3 results etc. You have to search through three pages to see the same number of results that you get on one page when using Google. I *have* won Swag Bucks by using their search engine (I won some by executing my example search), but usually only 2 or 7. I think the fastest way to earn Swag Bucks is to complete their offers or win game tournaments.

My favorite GPT site is Beezag they pay you to watch ads. You get from 20 to over 100 points for each ad you watch and they send you ads every day I’ve cashed out 2 times so far and am getting ready to cash out again.

I’ve Tried That was started in 2007 to help protect consumers from falling victim to online scams. We’ve written thousands of articles, helped millions of people, and have saved a countless amount of money from falling into the wrong hands.